We are not normal people

Chances are a product will succeed or fail for reasons neither the designers nor the customers understand. Consider the personal computer -- the best minds in technology were offered a chance to get in at the start, and nearly all of them turned it down. Hewlett-Packard repeatedly rejected Steve Wozniak's proposals until he quit and developed his ideas with Steve Jobs in a garage. Then IBM created a rather limited knockoff PC, expecting it to serve only as an "entry system" to their main product line, which was large systems. Pretty soon the tail wagged the dog.

And the Internet -- no one saw it coming, even when it was on top of them. No one was able to predict any aspect of that phenomenon, something that remains true.

About people's tastes and choices in entertainment, Hollywood screenwriter William Goldman famously said, "Nobody knows anything". I agree, and I think it applies to technology as well.

The bottom line -- if you ask customers what they want, what they might buy, they won't be able to tell you. I disagreed with Steve Jobs about practically everything, but he was dead right about this.

I think the author was simply trying to articulate a rift that sometimes occurs between a party with a (perceived or actual) problem and the party with solutions for that problem. According to his barbershop example, that problem/solution rift is the result of a fundamental misunderstanding of the problem statement. If I could abstract the article in one sentence, I would say, "If you are trying to solve a problem that you yourself do not have, make sure you actually understand the problem from the perspective of the party you are solving it for before you go building things."

The author may have gone a bit far in generalizing programmers/engineers, but would you agree it is fair to say that it is easy enough for _anyone_ to fall into the aforementioned trap if they are not conscious of it?

An occurring theme I have noticed while speaking with people (not just engineers and/or programmers) is that we have a tendency to project ourselves on other people. I don't think that is a bad thing in moderation (that's a different matter of discourse), but I have had at least two different conversations with entrepreneurs where they simply could not for the life of them understand why someone would rather "just get a job working for someone else" than start their own company. It simply does not register in their world view that someone does not share their way of thinking. My anecdote is tangential at best, but my point is that the object of the article is not to diminish programmers. Rather, it is to elevate the perspective of those subject to a certain myopia that they would otherwise not think to confront.

Some of the premium places will be booked out three months in advance, but then make mention of potential cancellations on their web site contact page. e.g., "Sometimes we get cancellations. Please call us just in case." Seems to be like that would make for a huge amount of wasted staff time dealing with those sorts of queries.

If voice is crucial, save yourself answering the phone with some sort of Twilio setup to handle the majority of calls with a series of questions about timing and duration of appointment. In the preamble mention online bookings and see if the majority stick with phone.

I know I'd vastly prefer a web booking system for almost everything - restaurants, car service, medical appointments, etc.

If you're relying on an online system too it has to be absolutely solid - which means expense. Or at least more expense than a wall-calendar or a paper diary [book].

It's hard to have an over-view of, say, the next couple of months work with an online system - a big wall-calendar makes things easier to visualise. Of course you could have a massive touch-screen computer ...

If you're running a salon, with multiple barbers then I can see it being cost-effective to try and have customers self-schedule but it seems for a single barber that they'd have to be very up-market to make it worth while.

Would you go to a worse barber so you can schedule online instead of by phone? Would you pay more, how much, to be able to schedule online?

Personally if I use a barber's it's a simple drop-in service.

[Any suggestions for an appointments booking system to check out?]